- The Minecraft 1.21 Tricky Trials update was officially released on June 13 and is related to combat and tinkering.
- New confirmed mobs include the Breeze and Bogged. There's also a new underground structure called the Trial Chamber.
- New confirmed features include the crafter, trial spawner, ominous trials, vault, ominous vault, mace, wind charge, copper bulb, and more.
Minecraft 1.21 is the new major update released for everyone’s beloved sandbox game. The update is now rolling out, bringing some new areas to explore along with fun combat challenges to all players. In this guide, we’ve shed light on the latest Minecraft 1.21 features like the trial chamber, the crafter, brand-new mobs like Bogged and Breeze, and new tuff and copper blocks. So, let’s check out all that the Tricky Trials update has in store for us.
Editor’s Note: Last updated on June 13, 2024, to streamline the content and improve the readability
Minecraft 1.21 Release Date (Confirmed)
As part of the game’s 15th anniversary celebrations, Mojang surprised its players with two major announcements. One is that a Minecraft animated series is coming exclusively to Netflix soon. The second is the official release date for the Minecraft 1.21 update, which is June 13. So, the ability to explore and combat the new mobs in the Trial Chambers arrived on this date.
Minecraft 1.21 Update Name
The last major update – Minecraft 1.20 – didn’t have an official name when it was first announced in October 2022. Minecraft 1.20 got its official name months later. This was possibly an outcome of the community discontent mentioned in the previous section.
For this reason, the Mojang team took its sweet time with naming the Minecraft 1.21 update, but it has officially revealed the name for the next major update. The Minecraft 1.21 update is called the Minecraft Tricky Trials.
Mojang revealed the official name in the April edition of the Minecraft Monthly video, which we’ve embedded below. The name Tricky Trials aptly describes the upcoming update, which focuses on the new challenges that players will face in the Trial Chambers, and well, they will be tricky for sure.
New Mobs in Minecraft 1.21
1. The Breeze
The Breeze is a new hostile mob in Minecraft, only found in the Trial Chamber structure (more on this below). It will have a distinctive attack called the wind charge. This attack will damage anything that it collides directly with.
When that happens, it will create a wind burst knocking back entities by several blocks. Breeze also drops breeze rods, items used in several crafting recipes.
2. The Bogged
Bogged is a green skeleton variant that shoots poison arrows at you, applying a poison status effect for 4 seconds. You will encounter the Bogged in swamps, mangrove swamps, and the newly added trial chambers.
The winner of the Minecraft Mob Vote 2023 was the armadillo, and while we expected this little mob to arrive with the 1.21 update, it was released in the Minecraft 1.20.5 update called Armored Paws.
Minecraft 1.21: Are There Any New Biomes?
With the release of Snapshot 24w13a during testing, Mojang announced that there will be no new feature additions to Minecraft 1.21. So, to answer your question, no, there are no new biomes or biome updates introduced in this update.
New Features Added in Minecraft 1.21
1. Crafter
The crafter block is the ultimate form of the crafting table. It’s a utility block that can allow you to automate crafting. By activating this block, the item you completed the crafting recipe for will get crafted and pushed out.
One more amazing feature of this block is that you can toggle slots, so you can program the crafter where to place the ingredients. We’ve created a dedicated guide about the crafter block in Minecraft 1.21, so check it out to learn everything related to this mind-blowing addition.
2. Trial Chambers
Trial Chambers are new, procedurally generated structures in Minecraft that focus on exploration and combat. You can easily find trial chambers in four different ways. Moreover, this structure has lots of different and unique rooms.
While exploring the tunnels in Trial Chambers, you will stumble upon parkour challenges, vaults, safe rooms with beds, underwater rooms, ominous vaults, and lots and lots of trial spawners. We have also compiled a list of trial chambers Minecraft seeds, so check those to start your adventure right away.
3. Ominous Bottle
The ominous bottle is an item that grants the Bad Omen effect of the level the bottle itself has. You may get it by killing pillager raid captains, as well as looting standard and ominous vaults. With the Bad Omen effect, you can walk into a village and it’ll turn into Raid Omen.
4. Trial Spawner & Ominous Spawner
The trial spawner is a special spawner type that will adapt to the number of players around. It spawns a limited number of mobs, which are divided into 4 categories – melee, small melee, ranged and the Breeze’s category.
Every trial chamber will spawn mobs from all four categories and only one mob per category. The blocks around a spawner indicate the mobs that will spawn from it. Once you defeat the mobs, the trial spawner goes into the cooldown state and drops some precious rewards.
When you have the Bad Omen effect, you can approach a trial spawner and it’ll automatically turn into an ominous trial spawner. This spawner will summon mobs with equipment and also random projectiles and potions above you and the mobs.
5. Trial Key & Ominous Trial Key
The trial key is an item you can get from several different sources — entrance chest, decorated pots in the corridor, and trial spawners after you’ve killed all the mobs that spawn from it. The trial key opens the vault block in the Trial Chambers.
The Ominous trial key is the ominous version of the trial key. Unlike its regular counterpart, it can only be obtained once you kill all the mobs summoned by the ominous trial spawner. There is a 30% chance you’ll get this scary-looking key from the ominous vault.
6. The Vault & Ominous Vault
The vault in Minecraft is a block you can open with the trial key. It will then spit out items onto itself that you can pick up. Every player that opens the vault will be rewarded, but only once.
You probably get the point by now, so the ominous vault is an ominous version of the vault. Unlike the ominous trial spawner, this block generates naturally in trial chambers. These blocks give you far better rewards than the normal vaults, including the heavy core item.
7. Breeze Rods
Breeze rods are items you get by killing the Breeze. These items are used in crafting recipes for the wind charge, the new mace weapon, and the flow armor trim. Moreover, you may combine it with the damaged mace in an anvil to restore 25% of the mace’s durability.
8. Heavy Core
Heavy core is an item that’s smaller than a full solid block. You can only obtain it from the ominous vault in trial chambers, where the chance of it being chosen is only 8.4%. This item can be combined with the breeze rod in a crafting grid to make the mace.
9. Mace
Mace is a new melee weapon you may craft with a breeze rod and heavy core. Its damage increases when you fall, so the longer you fall the more damage it will do. Not only that, but you can enchant it with the exclusive mace enchantments to further increase its damage.
If you manage to hit the target, you’ll negate all fall damage and also deal a ton of damage to the mob. Furthermore, mace will also create an AOE that will knock back nearby entities.
10. Wind Charge
Wind charge is an item and a projectile you can use by right-clicking or using the secondary action button. You can get 4 of them by breaking down breeze rods in a crafting grid.
It creates a small area of effect that will knock back entities and damage them if it hits them directly. Not only that, but it will also fling players in the air, making it a super cool addition to parkour mini-games. Check out some of the coolest uses of wind charge via our linked article.
11. Copper and Tuff Blocks
Many amazing tuff and copper building blocks have been added to the game with this update, and we have showcased all of them in the linked post, so check it out to learn more about them. You’ll find them throughout the Trial Chambers, but you may also craft them. We have also penned some dedicated copper block guides, so go through them while you’re here:
- How to make copper trapdoor in Minecraft 1.21
- How to make a copper door in Minecraft 1.21
- How to make copper grates in Minecraft 1.21
12. Copper Bulb
The copper bulb is a new light source block in Minecraft and the amount of light it emits depends on its oxidation stage. If this block is fully oxidized, it will emit the lowest light level.
On the other hand, if it’s at the initial stage and fully orange, Copper Bulb will glow the brightest in your world. You can wax the copper bulb using honeycomb to preserve its state. This new bulb has a special interaction with redstone that you can check out in the linked guide.
13. Other New Features
Minecraft 1.21 introduces two new armor trims (flow and bolt armor trims), two banner patterns (flow and guster banner patterns), and three new pottery sherds (scrape, guster, and flow pottery sherds). Four brand new potions have been added with the update, along with 20 new paintings in Minecraft.
There are 9 new background tracks created by three artists – Lena Raine, Aaron Cherof, and Kumi Tanioka. Not only that, there are three new music discs in the game now.
We previously mentioned leaks about the Minecraft Marketplace pass, which will be a subscription service available for players with the 1.21 update. However, the Marketplace pass has already gone official on March 12.
These are all the confirmed new features in the Minecraft 1.21 update. So, what is your favorite 1.21 feature? Let us know in the comments below!
